The friend tells me that, interestingly, the Republican candidates' signs have the word "Republican" nowhere to be found.  My friend also tells me the signs are basically the same in every district and that only the names will change.  The top name will be the candidate for Senate, then the word "Senate", and then below there will be two names for Assembly candidates and then the word "Assembly" below that.  

And the primary color of the sign is ... (wait for it) ... blue.  A nice medium blue, just like the elephant logo for the 08 convention we all laughed at last week.

No elephants on the signs, though.

This tells me, and I told my friend, that it seems the sign design has been imposed from on high inside the Rethug HQ, and that the Rethugs made a conscious decision to run away from party identification.  Moreover, the whole blue color of the signs appears to be an attempt to fuzz the party distinction even more, by appropriating the color most associated with the Democrats.  

While the friend hasn't seen any TV ads, I wouldn't be surprised if they're all made along the same lines - avoid party identification at all costs.

Brown explained that since British forces "handed over our base in Basra City in early September, the present security situation has been calmer." As evidence, he noted, "In the last month, there have been five indirect fire attacks on Basra Air Station compared with 87 in July."

Indeed, Reuters reported last week, "Residents of Iraq's southern city of Basra have begun strolling riverfront streets again after four years of fear, their city much quieter since British troops withdrew from the grand Saddam Hussein-era Basra Palace."

think progress

A small private intelligence company that monitors Islamic terrorist groups obtained a new Osama bin Laden video ahead of its official release last month, and around 10 a.m. on Sept. 7, it notified the Bush administration of its secret acquisition. It gave two senior officials access on the condition that the officials not reveal they had it until the al-Qaeda release.

Within 20 minutes, a range of intelligence agencies had begun downloading it from the company's Web site. By midafternoon that day, the video and a transcript of its audio track had been leaked from within the Bush administration to cable television news and broadcast worldwide.

The founder of the company, the SITE Intelligence Group, says this premature disclosure tipped al-Qaeda to a security breach and destroyed a years-long surveillance operation that the company has used to intercept and pass along secret messages, videos and advance warnings of suicide bombings from the terrorist group's communications network.

I think this guy in Iowa was confused as to the substance of this proposed nonbinding resolution, just as I was confused when I first read about it.  Doubtless many other people are confused by a proposal that is little more than some vague pointless political gamesmanship, which will ultimately amount to nothing.

Clinton, like most of the other Democrats in Congress seem to simply want to appear to be doing something about Iraq and this rogue White House, while continuing to do what they've been doing since the last election, absolutely nothing.

The American people are fed up with this disingenuous garbage, it's transparent and infuriating.

Hillary says that she's working on legislation that will prevent the president from taking military action against Iran, good luck getting anything like that passed with this Congress.  Even if she managed it, Bush would just veto it, and if by some unbelievable turn of fortune which allowed the house and Senate to override the president's veto, George which simply ignore it and go ahead with the invasion of Iran anyway claiming that the Congress was infringing on executive power.

This whole thing is making me sick, as I watch the United States of America being hijacked by one man, one man who has an insane messianic belief that he has been called upon by God to invade the Middle East and liberate us all from constitutional democracy.

I greatly fear what is ahead for this country, I suspect it will be far more horrible than we can possibly imagine.

If we don't remove this president soon, there may be no United States of America come 2009. Our country will be renamed the Bush Republic.  George will dawn a military uniform and seize direct control over our country's armed forces, much like his friend Musharraf.  The White House won't call it a coup, they'll just claim that the commander-in-chief is exercising his newly defined executive power and take a more hands-on role in the management of the military.

The troops will begin calling him General Bush, and he'll have a special uniform made up with six stars on the collar.  After that the arrests and purges will begin, political enemies first, the disloyal Democrats next, then the Republicans, followed by the Jews, Gypsies, homosexuals, the disabled, Jehovah's Witnesses etc.

you can't have it both ways. at least breathe again.

koshembos, the "flat tax" idea has been around for decades, here and abroad. it fails to ignite, once people realize it would be far less fair than even our own current, muddled system.

Berger eventually pled guilty to a misdemeanor charge of unauthorized removal and retention of classified material on April 1, 2005. Under a plea agreement, U.S. attorneys recommended a fine of $10,000 and a loss of security clearance for three years. However, on September 8, U.S. Magistrate Judge Deborah Robinson increased the fine to $50,000 at Berger's sentencing. Robinson stated, "The court finds the fine [recommended by government prosecutors] is inadequate because it doesn't reflect the seriousness of the offense."[14] Berger was also ordered to serve two years of probation and to perform 100 hours of community service.[15]

Critics suggest Berger destroyed primary evidence revealing anti-terrorism policies and actions, and that his motive was to permanently erase Clinton administration pre-9/11 mistakes from the public record. Public statements to this effect have been made by talk-radio host Rush Limbaugh,[16] former Clinton campaign advisor Dick Morris,[17] USA Today reporter Jack Kelley,[18] multiple times by Fox News correspondent John Gibson (the last as recently as December 2006[19]), and former House Speaker Dennis Hastert (Republican-Illinois), who said: "What information could be so embarrassing that a man with decades of experience in handling classified documents would risk being caught pilfering our nation's most sensitive secrets?"[20]

After a long investigation, the lead prosecutor Noel Hillman, chief of the Justice Department's Public Integrity Section, stated that Berger only removed classified copies of data stored on hard drives stored in the National Archives, and that no original material was destroyed.[21] His and the FBI's opinion of the case initially led The Wall Street Journal to editorialize against the allegations.[22][23]

You'll have to do better with your anti-Clinton snark, PPJ, this one wasn't even up to ankle-biting as it was was easily refuted.

Hey folks, I wonder whose blackmailing PPJ so that  all he writes supports wingnut causes around here.

Nurse who is charged with a child's death is testifying right now.

Guard Testifies in His Boot Camp Trial